


offline

by Coriana



Category: NieR: Automata (Video Game)
Genre: Drama, One Shot, Romance, Spoilers, Tragedy, collection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-13
Updated: 2017-08-13
Packaged: 2018-12-14 23:37:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 999
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11793822
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Coriana/pseuds/Coriana
Summary: A collection of NieR: Automata one shots.Chapter One: A2 wonders why she feels these emotions over the death of machine.





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**Author's Note:**

> Any one shot written here in this collection can be taken from any part of the game that could contain spoilers. Please read at your own risk. :)

* * *

 

"Inquisition: why would unit A2 purposely try to induce a possibility of a reckless scenario where it could possibly cause harm to oneself if she were caught off-guard?"

"Pod, be quiet."

"Proposal: Unit A2 should consider why she is interested in performing an unnecessary act of old world behavior."

"I don't… I don't know. You've already asked me that, quit repeating yourself."

"Unverified order."

The pod grew silent as A2 continued. She clawed at the earth with her bare hands, digging her way through the deadpan and into the soil. The hole wasn't very wide, nor particularly deep, but it was the best A2 could do.

Carefully, she placed Pascal's core into the hole in the earth. It felt warm in her hands, which made her feel colder inside.

She hadn't known where to bury him at first. In the end, she had decided on his village. A place he had brought up from the ground. Even if its last days hadn't been peaceful, there was still an odd sense of stillness amongst the burned foliage and the smell of metal. And it felt right.

When Pascal had asked her to end his life, either through memory deletion or death, A2's mind reeled, a dullness thudding within her chest. What was she to do? The deletion scared her more than Pascal's death – A2 was used to death. She had killed. She had lost squad mates that had been killed before her by her own kind, no less.

The deletion… she finally realized… scared her far more.

Even if the memories were erased, shouldn't _something_ remember? How could it be fair to the part of Pascal that was deleted? Would what was leftover only become a hollow husk as to what he used to be?

Did the mind really just… forget? Or was it forever… imprinted?

It scared her for herself, too. What if her memory had once been tampered with, as was very possibly with YoRHa, and what did she not remember? What had been taken from her, that she didn't even know? Ripped from her fingers, without even a question or an answer? How was it fair to the robot children to be forgotten?

"Assessment: A2's breathing pattern has become unstable."

A2 steadied her breathing, and ignored the Pod. Why was she reacting this way? At one moment, her whole life only existed to remove machines from the world and avenge what they had done to her, and the next she was running duties and requests for… people… of a robot village?

She had considered walking away from Pascal after he had asked for his final wish, but she couldn't leave a comrade alone on a field, whom had lost everything, even their will, to live.

Even with the 'thank you' that Pascal whispered in the end, nothing felt right. The whole thing was messed up and broken. Everything wasn't right. She had killed Pascal.

These days, it was all she was good for.

Slowly, she started to fill the hole back in with dirt. This old world action of a burial was so foreign to her, but it had been solemn to once read about in old records. Perhaps humans were strange, but their rites of passage seemed to still carry airs of sadness, even after all these centuries.

And it was fitting for Pascal, wasn't it? To end in an old world way, which he was so fascinated with?

Or maybe it wasn't right or fair to the robot, and she should have just deleted his memory. Wouldn't that have been fair, to just forget?

But… A2 wasn't designed to think. Maybe this was why she always regretted any decisions she had to make. She hadn't been designed to make decisions.

A2 wanted to describe herself as an empty, unemotional person. Although it wasn't who she had been programmed to be, it was who she had become. But there was something that was dangerously filling this emptiness. And she didn't know what it was or what it could be and it scared her.

Deep down, A2 was _scared_.

_Of._

_Everything._

And was this fear filling in the void? What was it that was taking away her cold, rational mind? Why did she care that the robot children died when she was built to deal with death?

Why did she suddenly think about the small, baby forest king who had been murdered by her own blade, and the ones who gave their lives to protect it?

Maybe it was because… they had been so scared.

But they hadn't been programmed to feel scared.

But… neither had she.

"Observation: Unit A2 seems to have clouded her vision, which could cause a problem with any unexpected need to battle."

"I'm not crying, you flying metal bucket." She ignored that her fingers came away stained with wet after she ran her hand across her eyes. "It's just sweat."

Pod 042 knew the chemical composition difference between tears and sweat, but said nothing.

A2 mounded the dirt over Pascal's burial place, and swallowed hard. She told herself that after she counted to three, she would recompose herself. She didn't have time to contemplate all these odd emotions that played within her. She didn't have time to mourn for her enemy. She needed to be focused at the task at hand. It was what she did best.

_One._

_I'm sorry, Pascal. You deserved better than this._

_Two._

The children deserved more than this. She should have buried them, too.

_Three._

A2 brought herself to her feet. The burial looked too small to her, but she had nothing to act as a headstone. She had to move forward. She had to not look back.

Quietly, she slit off a piece of her hair. She laid the lock on the burial mound. It was all she could do.

"Rest in peace," she whispered.

Apparently, this was all she could do.

She turned on her heel. She had to keep moving.

"Pod… let's go."

"…Affirmative."

* * *

 


End file.
